Leviticus 26:7

And ye shall chase your enemies, and they shall fall before you by the sword.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(7) And ye shall chase your enemies.—If, covetous of their prosperity, the enemies should dare to attack them, God will inspire His people with marvellous courage, so that they will not only pursue them, but put them to the sword.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

26:1-13 This chapter contains a general enforcement of all the laws given by Moses; by promises of reward in case of obedience, on the one hand; and threatenings of punishment for disobedience, on the other. While Israel maintained a national regard to God's worship, sabbaths, and sanctuary, and did not turn aside to idolatry, the Lord engaged to continue to them temporal mercies and religious advantages. These great and precious promises, though they relate chiefly to the life which now is, were typical of the spiritual blessings made sure by the covenant of grace to all believers, through Christ. 1. Plenty and abundance of the fruits of the earth. Every good and perfect gift must be expected from above, from the Father of lights. 2. Peace under the Divine protection. Those dwell in safety, that dwell in God. 3. Victory and success in their wars. It is all one with the Lord to save by many or by few. 4. The increase of their people. The gospel church shall be fruitful. 5. The favour of God, which is the fountain of all Good. 6. Tokens of his presence in and by his ordinances. The way to have God's ordinances fixed among us, is to cleave closely to them. 7. The grace of the covenant. All covenant blessings are summed up in the covenant relation, I will be your God, and ye shall be my people; and they are all grounded upon their redemption. Having purchased them, God would own them, and never cast them off till they cast him off.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Compare the margin reference; Joel 2:19; Job 11:18.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

5. your threshing shall reach unto the vintage, and the vintage shall reach unto the sowing time, &c.—The barley harvest in Judea was about the middle of April; the wheat harvest about six weeks after, or in the beginning of June. After the harvest came the vintage, and fruit gathering towards the latter end of July. Moses led the Hebrews to believe that, provided they were faithful to God, there would be no idle time between the harvest and vintage, so great would be the increase. (See Am 9:13). This promise would be very animating to a people who had come from a country where, for three months, they were pent up without being able to walk abroad because the fields were under water.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

No text from Poole on this verse.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

And ye shall chase your enemies,.... Who being overcome in battle, and put to the flight, should be pursued:

and they shall fall before you by the sword; not by the sword of one another, as the Midianites did, Judges 7:21, so Jarchi; but rather by the sword of the Israelites, for oftentimes multitudes of the enemy are killed in a pursuit.

Geneva Study Bible

And ye shall chase your enemies, and they shall fall before you by the sword.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Leviticus 26:7

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The Lord would give peace in the land, and cause the beasts of prey which endanger life to vanish out of the land, and suffer no war to come over it, but would put to flight before the Israelites the enemies who attacked them, and cause them to fall into their sword. שׁכב, to lie without being frightened up by any one, is a figure used to denote the quiet and peaceable enjoyment of life, and taken from the resting of a flock in good pasture-ground (Isaiah 14:30) exposed to no attacks from either wild beasts or men. מחריד is generally applied to the frightening of men by a hostile attack (Micah 4:4; Jeremiah 30:10; Ezekiel 39:26; Job 11:19); but it is also applied to the frightening of flocks and animals (Isaiah 17:2; Deuteronomy 28:26; Jeremiah 7:33, etc.). רעה חיּה: an evil animal, for a beast of prey, as in Genesis 37:20. "Sword," as the principal weapon applied, is used for war. The pursuing of the enemy relates to neighbouring tribes, who would make war upon the Israelites. לחרב נפל does not mean to be felled by the sword (Knobel), but to fall into the sword. The words, "five of you shall put a hundred to flight, and a hundred ten thousand," are a proverbial expression for the most victorious superiority of Israel over their enemies. It is repeated in the opposite sense and in an intensified form in Deuteronomy 32:30 and Isaiah 30:17.